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Kevin Coogan was a great investigative journalist and author of the brilliant book Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International. He passed away earlier this month. In tribute to him, we’ve compiled a bibliography of his writings. If there are any additions, contact us on Twitter @FFRAFAction.

Articles

‘Jackboots and Sporrans: The Strange World of Robert Gayre’ Anarchy no. 38, pp. 10-13. Available online at http://libcom.org/files/anarchy-38.pdf. [NB This was reproduced from Parapolitics without KC’s permission].

This is a list (with media links) of some of the worst examples of violence & terrorism from right wing extremists in the UK in the 21st Century.

This is adapted (and updated with the chronology fixed) from a Twitter thread which can be found here but we thought it would be useful to have a back up copy which was also easier to navigate. Please let us know of any other examples of serious extreme right violence and terrorism we should add to this.

2002. David Tovey, a white supremacist who stockpiled guns and explosives to launch a potentially murderous race war was jailed for 11 years.

2006. Terry Collins, a former BNP member, was jailed for 5 yrs after a serial campaign of racial harassment against 3 families in Eastbourne. His friend Allen Boyce was convicted for encouraging him to bomb asylum seekers.

2007 (Feb). John Laidlaw found guilty on 3 counts of attempted murder after a shooting spree and given an indeterminate prison sentence for the protection of the public. He had threatened to “kill all black people” and claimed to be a member of the BNP.

2008 (Jun). Nazi sympathiser and paedophile, Martyn Gilleard, who made nail bombs to attack black, Asian and Jewish people was jailed for 16 years. He was found guilty of terrorist offences & also of possessing child pornography.

2008 (Dec). Neo-Nazi, Nathan Worrell, who hoarded bombmaking materials & waged a racist campaign against a mixed-race couple was jailed for 7 years. He was guilty of possession of material for terrorist purposes & racially aggravated harassment.

2014 (Oct.) Neo-nazi troll Garron Helm was sentenced to four weeks in prison after sending an abusive antisemitic Tweet to Jewish MP, Luciana Berger. He tweeted a picture of the MP with a Holocaust yellow star superimposed on her forehead, with the hashtag “Hitler was right”. He would later be charged but acquitted of membership of National Action after it was banned.

2015. Zack Davies, ‘a Nazi-obsessed loner’, & supporter of nazi group National Action, found guilty of racist attack that almost killed an Asian man. He screamed ‘white power’ before attacking with a machete.

2017 (Feb). Darren Osborne terror attack which left one man dead & 12 injured after he drove a van into people outside a mosque in Finsbury Park. He was radicalised after viewing Tommy Robinson videos & found guilty in Feb 2018.

2017 (Feb). Sean Creighton, jailed for 5 years after pleading guilty to hate crimes including possessing a terrorist manual. He admitted to posting racist, Islamophobic, homophobic & anti-Semitic material on social media. He was member of NF & idolised Hitler.

2018 (Mar). Paul Moore jailed for 20 years for attempted murder after racist attack in 2017 in Leicester which was “fuelled by anti-Muslim hatred”. He drove car at a Somali woman who suffered life-changing injuries. He also drove car at a 12-yr old Somali girl.

2018 (Apr). Connor Ward convicted of planning terrorism and jailed for life with minimum sentence of 6 years. He acquired components for potential bombs & kept list of Scottish mosques & had notebook stating, “This is dedicated to all that follow Mohammed and Islamic faith. You will all soon suffer your demise.”

2018 (May). Wayne Bell jailed for four years and three months for neo-Nazi group social media posts. He was described as a “poster boy” for National Action and posted hundreds of racist and antisemitic messages.

2018 (May). Ethan Stables, a ‘homophobic, racist Nazi’ given indefinite hospital order after being found guilty of preparing an act of terrorism, threats to kill and possessing explosives. He planned to attack a gay pride event.

2018 (Jun). Jack Renshaw, alleged to be a member of National Action, pleaded guilty to preparing acts of terrorism and making threats to kill a police officer. It was alleged he planned to kill Labour MP, Rosie Cooper. Due to other trials he was not sentenced until 2019.

2018 (Jul). Jack Coulson, a teenager who made a pipe bomb in his Nazi memorabilia-filled bedroom was sent to youth custody for four years and eight months. The 19-year-old admitted possessing a document or record for terror. He was previously found guilty in 2017 of constructing an explosive device and given a youth rehabilitation order. He was described as a member of National Action.

2018 (Jul). Thomas Wyllie and Alex Bolland, both 15, plotted a Columbine-style massacre and planned to shoot and kill pupils and teachers at the school in Northallerton, North Yorkshire. Prosecutors said Wyllie, who was described as the ring-leader, was motivated by a “far right-wing” and “twisted ideology”. Wyllie was handed a 12-year custodial sentence while his co-defendant was given 10 years.

2018 (Aug). Peter Morgan, a right-wing extremist caught with a bomb-making kit in his Edinburgh flat was sentenced to 12 years in jail. A Nazi flag, far-right literature & terrorist training manuals were also found.

2018 (Aug). Austin Ross, was jailed for six years after he admitted setting fire to a Masonic hall and school in Newport, daubing swastikas and racist slogans and putting up posters on buildings which proclaimed “Hitler did nothing wrong”. He was connected to the small neo-nazi group System Resistance Network (SRN).

2018 (Sep). Steven Bracher, a “man with extreme racist and homophobic views” was jailed for more than three years for making bombs and stockpiling weapons including crossbows and knives at his home in a Devon village. 17 “viable” improvised explosive devices (IEDs) were found at his home.

2018 (Nov). Lance Corporal Mikko Vehvilainen, a soldier, was convicted of being a member of neo-Nazi group National Action & sentenced to 8 years in prison. It was alleged he tried to recruit for NA while in the army.

2018 (Nov). Alexander Deakin sentenced to 8 years for membership of nazi group National Action & 12 months for posting racist stickers at Aston University. He was hiding in a broom cupboard when found by police.

2018 (Dec). 6 nazis jailed for membership of terror group National Action. Adam Thomas & Claudia Patatas, who named their baby after Hitler, were jailed for 6.5 years and 5 years. Daniel Bogunovic, a “committed National Action leader, propagandist and strategist”, was jailed for six years and four months. Darren Fletcher, described by the judge as an “extreme member”, was sentenced to five years. Nathan Pryke, the group’s “security enforcer” was given five years and five months and Joel Wilmore, the “banker” and “cyber security” specialist, was imprisoned for five years and 10 months.

2019 (Mar). Martin Stokes, 25, jailed for 5 yrs after he injured 3 people when he deliberately drove his car into a group of pedestrians outside a Muslim community centre in Cricklewood, London & hurled “racist and anti-Islamic taunts”.

2019 (Apr). Steven Bishop, a far-right terrorist planned to bomb UK’s largest mosque in South London ‘to get justice’ for the Manchester arena attack. He was preparing explosives after becoming ‘fixated’ on the Manchester Arena bombing’s youngest victim & was sentenced to 4 years in prison.

2019 (Apr). Shane Fletcher, a white supremacist who described himself as a “big fan of Hitler”, was jailed for 9 yrs. He had tried to buy gas canisters for an explosive van attack, & compiled instructions on making pipe bombs & “improvised napalm”. He wanted to emulate the US Columbine High School attackers who shot dead 12 students in 1999.

2019 (May). Craig Totney, a supporter of neo-nazi music network Blood & Honour was sentenced to 5 years in prison after being caught with Taser, CS spray, sword & far right literature at his West Midlands home.

2019 (May). Jack Renshaw, a leading member of National Action, was jailed for life for terror plot to murder Labour MP Rosie Cooper. Must serve at least 20 years in prison. It was also revealed he was a convicted paedophile who was jailed for 16 months in June 2018 for four counts of grooming adolescent boys.

2019 (Jun). 2 teenage neo-nazis from Sonnenkrieg Division, Michal Szewczuk & Oskar Dunn-Koczorowski, who encouraged an attack on Prince Harry for marrying a woman of mixed race, were jailed for 4 years and 18 month detention & training order for terrorism offences. The teens used pseudonyms to run personal accounts on the Gab social media site, as well as sharing control of the Sonnenkrieg Division’s own page, on which they posted self-designed propaganda that encouraged terrorist attacks.

2019 (Jul). Daniel Ward, 28, from Birmingham, a “fanatical” neo-Nazi who called for race war was jailed for 3 yrs for belonging to banned far-right group National Action. He glorified violence, labelled Jews “cause of all evil” & said “Hitler was right”.

2019 (Sep). White supremacist David Parnham who sent “Punish a Muslim Day” letters to mosques and high-profile figures last year, encouraging violence against followers of Islam, was jailed for 12 and a half years. He pleaded guilty to 15 offences relating to hundreds of letters written between June 2016 and June 2018. They included encouraging murder, making hoaxes involving noxious substances and bombs, sending letters with intent to cause distress, and encouraging offences.

2019 (Sep). Nathan Worrell was found guilty of eight offences of stirring up racial hatred at Grimsby Crown Court and jailed for 30 months. During the trial, Worrell denied the Holocaust took place and said he had been a member of the Ku Klux Klan. He was previously jailed for seven years and three months (see 2008) for possessing bomb-making materials and waging a hate campaign against a mixed-race couple.

2019 (Sep). Vincent Fuller, a far-right terrorist who tried to kill Muslims in a rampage, the day after Christchurch attack on a mosque which killed over 50 people, was jailed for more than 18 years. He shouted “all Muslims should die” after watching a Facebook livestream broadcast by the New Zealand shooter.

2019 (Sep). Jacek Tchorzewski, 18, of High Wycombe, a neo-Nazi whose “dream” was to carry out a terrorist attack jailed for 4 years for possessing bomb-making manuals and instructions on how to make firearms.

2019 (Sep). Jay Davison, who shared photos of himself holding a shotgun alongside anti-Muslim messages has been jailed for four years.He posted the “extremely offensive” messages in August 2018, Cardiff Crown Court heard. A jury found him guilty of stirring up religious hatred and two counts of stirring up racial hatred.

2019 (Oct). David Dudgeon from East Lothian, jailed for 2 years after he downloaded terror manuals on how to make bombs & murder people. He also possessed extreme right wing material on Holocaust denial, antisemitism, ISIS beheading videos, & info on Tommy Robinson.

2019 (Oct). Far-right security guard Pawel‌ ‌Golaszewski‌, whose views were “Islamophobic and of an extreme right-wing nature”, was jailed for more than 2 years. He collected manuals on building bombs & killing with bare hands, had a stash of knives and had looked into obtaining a gun.

2019 (Oct). Kieran Cleary, 16-year-old boy who made a potential bomb filled with shrapnel, jailed for five years. He had praised Hitler & searched extreme right & anti-Muslim material. He told friends he was going to “kill many people.”

2019 (Oct.) Ian Hargreaves was jailed for 18 months after pleading guilty to two counts of sending malicious communications, possession of an offensive weapon in a public place and possession of indecent images of children. The far-right extremist threatened to kill BBC broadcasters and racially abused Lewis Hamilton.

There is a large volume of literature on the far right in the UK covering the fascist tradition from the 1920s to the present day. But which books should you read?

This article provides a brief, necessarily selective, introduction to the extensive bibliography on the UK far-right.[i] It is aimed at activists and the general reader rather than academic specialists. Most of the books listed here can be bought new or second hand relatively easily.

Thurlow’s book remains the best single volume covering the history of British fascism from the 1920s to the National Front. It is impeccably researched, accessible and makes effective use of primary sources from both the far right and the National Archives. It is probably the best starting point for a reader new to the subject although it now needs to be supplemented with other books on more recent developments.

Richardson’s book is more up to date and also covers the entire history of British fascism but draws on discourse analysis to provide an interesting examination of far-right propaganda techniques. He provides some great examples of how groups such as the British National Party (BNP) used codewords and ‘doublespeak’ to hide their core fascist ideology as well as examining their use of visual imagery. It also has good sections on gender, the environment, economics and violence.

Hayes’ book also contains a potted history as well as a lengthy discussion of fascist ideology and the many contested interpretations of it. The author is a former Anti-Fascist Action (AFA) activist so this is written from a staunchly anti-fascist perspective but it provides a good summary of theories of fascism applied to the UK context.

Durham’s book is one of the best discussions of gender and gender politics in the far right and includes examples from the British Union of Fascists and the National Front. As well as exploring the role of women within far-right organisations, he also examines fascist policies on birth control, abortion, eugenics and women’s rights.

Sir Oswald Mosley and William Joyce (aka Lord Haw-Haw) are the two most written about figure in British fascism and the biographies by Dorril and Holmes are by far the most impressive works on both. Holmes’ biography is scrupulously researched and referenced, highly readable and does a great job of locating Joyce within the wider context of British fascism, anti-Semitism and Nazi-fellow travelling. Dorril’s book demolishes the lies and obfuscations cultivated by postwar fascists keen to whitewash ‘the great leader’. The sources are not included in the book though and it is weaker on the post-war era. Francis Beckett’s biography of his father John Beckett, who moved from the extreme left to the extreme right, is a superbly written combination of memoir, biography and political history which reveals much about the motivations that drive fanaticism and the personal consequences that often follow.

There are several books covering the interwar years but the monograph by Linehan and Lunn and Thurlow’s edited book are strongly recommended for the breadth of their coverage — looking not only at the BUF but Arnold Leese’s virulently antisemitic Imperial Fascist League and other extreme right groupuscules. Linehan also examines the cultural aspects of fascism, an approach that has rightly become more common among scholars. Griffiths book remains the best account of the Nazi fellow travellers in elite circles in the UK who favoured appeasement as a result of their antisemitism or pro-Nazi views. Weale’s book is still unsurpassed on the British traitors who sided with the Nazis during the war. Gottlieb’s book fills an important gap in the historiography with an impressively researched account of female fascist activism and the influence of feminist ideology and elements of the women’s movement on the fascist agenda.

· George Thayer, The British Political Fringe: A Profile (London: Anthony Blond, 1965).

Macklin’s book is the definitive account of Mosley’s post-war career and also an invaluable guide to the transnational and transatlantic extreme right networks that kept the ideological flame alive as they tried to adapt to the new realities of a ‘post-fascist’ epoch. Grundy’s book is a memoir of growing up with parents who were fanatical Mosleyites and is insightful about the psychological attractions of fascism as well as the personal cost. Thayer’s book is a journalistic account of ‘extremists’ of both left (including anti-fascists) and right but is still useful for its discussion of the revival of Nazism in the UK in the 1960s.

Colin Jordan — often described as ‘Britain’s Nazi Godfather’ was the leading figure in the national socialist tradition in the UK. Jackson’s biography is a thorough account of his career in various fringe neo-nazi groupuscules before he founded the British Movement (BM) which became the second largest extreme right group (behind the NF) in the 1970s. Jordan later became a ‘theoretician’ and inspiration to the transatlantic extreme right. Ray Hill was a leading figure in the BM but later recanted on his views and worked as an anti-fascist mole for Searchlight. His book is a vivid description of extreme right wing hatred and violence as well as a salutary lesson in redemption. Lowles’ volume is a fine journalistic account of the rise and demise of Nazi street gang and would-be-terrorists, Combat 18.

Goodrick-Clarke’s book is a well-researched and referenced scholarly account of the underground Nazi groups which have links to radical religions, the occult and other esoteric trends. The book has a global focus but has lots of material on the UK including on the white supremacist music scene which is clearly explained in the two booklets edited by Lowles and Silver and, Shekhovtsov and Jackson. The wider subcultures of postwar British fascism, including music, fashion, racist novels and ‘metapolitics’ are explored in Copsey and Richardson’s edited book.

National Front (NF) & British National Party (BNP)

· Martin Walker, The National Front (Glasgow: Fontana/Collins, 1977)

· Stan Taylor, The National Front in English Politics (London: Macmillan, 1982)

· Matthew Collins, Hate: My life in the British Far Right (London: Biteback, 2011)

· Nigel Copsey, Contemporary British Fascism: The British National Party and the Quest for Legitimacy 2nd edition (Basingstoke: Palgrave-Macmillan, 2008)

The NF was the most successful far right group in Britain throughout the 1970s and Walker’s book is an admirably clear history of the early years of the party by a Guardian journalist. Taylor’s book is the most accessible academic account providing much useful information on the party’s electoral performance and ideology. Collins’ memoir gives an occasionally unsettling inside account of the seedy underbelly of British fascism. The author is a far-right activist turned anti-racist campaigner who was originally active in the NF and on the fringes of C18 before working against the extreme right.

The BNP is the most successful extreme right party in electoral terms in British history and the scholarly accounts by Copsey and by Goodwin provide much telling detail on its modernisation programme in the first decade of the 21st Century when it moderated its rhetoric and presentation — if not the fascist ideology at its core. The book edited by Copsey and Macklin provides a variety of informative perspectives on the wider context such as the BNP’s relationships with other far-right parties at home and abroad, its treatment by the media and anti-fascist opposition. Trilling’s book is a very readable journalistic account of the BNP which is particularly strong on how disillusionment with New Labour contributed to the BNP’s growth. Copsey and Worley’s edited book examines a range of issues connected with the contemporary UK far right including economics, gender, transnational links, homophobia, Holocaust denial and music.

UKIP & The English Defence League (EDL)

· Robert Ford and Matthew Goodwin, Revolt on the Right: Explaining Support for the Radical Right in Britain (Abingdon: Routledge, 2014)

· Paul Stocker, English Uprising: Brexit and the Mainstreaming of the Far-Right(London: Melville House, 2017)

· Hilary Pilkington, Loud and Proud: Passion and Politics in the English Defence League (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2016)

· Joel Busher, The Making of Anti-Muslim Protest: Grassroots Activism in the English Defence League (Abingdon: Routledge, 2016)

Ford and Goodwin’s deservedly award-winning book is the definitive analysis of the social, cultural and economic underpinnings of the rise of the populist radical right party Ukip. While it is based on the very best political science methodology, the authors have taken care to ensure that the book is clearly written and accessible for non-specialists. It is essential reading to understand the appeal of the radical right in the UK to sections of the electorate and important background context for the Brexit result. Stocker’s book locates the Brexit vote in the longer term context of far-right ideas and policies becoming increasingly normalised and mainstream. It is particularly strong on the culpability of the tabloid media in this process.

Busher and Pilkington’s books on the EDL are both academic ethnographies. The authors spent considerable time with far right activists in order to better understand their motivations and worldview. It can be difficult when scholars do this as there is a risk that they ‘go native’ and end up being insufficiently objective but both tread this fine line carefully and there are some genuine insights into the psychological and social elements of far right activism. Pai’s book takes a similar approach but it is written by a journalist and so is an easier, if somewhat flawed, read.

[i] For a more detailed bibliography of the British far right, see Philip Rees, Fascism in Britain: An Annotated Bibliography. (Hassocks. Sussex: The Harvester Press, 1979) and Craig Fowlie ‘The British Far Right since 1967 — A Bibliographic Survey’ in Nigel Copsey and Matthew Worley, (eds.) Tomorrow Belongs to Us: The British Far-Right Since 1967, (Abingdon: Routledge, 2018) pp. 224–267.

This blog is linked to the Twitter account @FFRAFAction and features contributions from several researchers, academics and activists who investigate the far right.

The plan is to have posts on the historical and contemporary far right, as well as relevant book and film reviews. As we’re also interested in the radical left, there will also be occasional post on this too.

We’re new to the blogging game so bear with us if it takes some time before we find our feet!